Frost coated the edges of a shinobi's shirt as it furled against the wind. Shisui's breath froze in his lungs as his ANBU team came upon the sight—too late for the backup request they had summoned. Skin blue with cold and still with death lay against the white ground. An aging abdominal wound long emptied of congealed blood coated the navy shirt with burgundy.
"Search for survivors." Shisui's mouth was dry. In that moment, he was grateful that the ceramic crow mask hid his quivering lip. The dead shinobi was the captain of the team Sakura had been loaned to as a medic. Shisui had seen him bragging once in the ANBU locker room about his successful mission count. For a man who never prayed and didn't believe in a god, Shisui prayed beyond hope that Sakura was alive, that somehow, some way, she had escaped the carnage. Blood sprays and splatters against the frozen trees mocked his prayer.
A quarter mile away from the dead captain, the land had been eroded into a series of devastated holes. Loose soil was thrown across the landscape, lightly dusted with the morning's frost. Wisps of pink hair floated up from a pit when the icy wind picked up. His heart stopped beating the closer he walked toward her. Iron clung to the sparse snowflakes that hung in the air. Stuck in the ground at the edge of the crater that was clearly Sakura's handiwork, was a kunai. The ruby pendant necklace he had given her for her birthday was wrapped around the hilt, neatly clasped in the back.
Shisui had never had the chance to tell her it was his grandmother's. Such sentimentality between them was against their rules—no emotions, no attachments, only fun. He squeezed his eyes shut before he reached the edge of the pit and willed his Sharingan away. The chakra burned as it was forced back from his eyes. It threatened to spill over and return with every wave of emotion he felt standing there smelling her blood. The inheritance and curse of his ancestors wanted to consume him and douse the land in revenge before ever seeing her lifeless body.
He didn't want to remember this. Any of it.
The bite of the wind forced him back into reality when he removed his mask and tied it to his belt. Tears that had streaked down his face unwittingly froze to his skin beneath his still-closed eyes. Chakra brushed against the edges of his periphery. He could hear the rustle of clothing, the jingle of a bag buckle. Yugao had brought him the aid request two days ago. When she saw who was listed as the contact, she demanded to go with him. He should have denied it. As competent an ANBU agent and medic as Yugao was, Hayate would never forgive him if something happened to her. Worse still, he would never forgive himself if anything happened to his remaining genin teammate.
"Shisui?" Yugao whispered from below him. "She's alive."
His chest loosened and air filled his lungs. His heart beat again when he opened his eyes and saw the minute puff of air from Sakura's lips fight against the cold. He shook off the paralysis and lept down to Yugao. Melting snow covered Yugao's knees as she knelt over Sakura. Dried blood coated the edges of a hole in Sakura's shirt.
"Chakra exhaustion, a few broken bones that set wrong, and a genjutsu I can't fix. She's in good shape, considering. I don't know if they intentionally spared her but…"
Shisui held Sakura's still hand, feeling the cold through his leather gloves. The tip of her nose was blue. When Yugao retracted her chakra, Shisui scooped Sakura up into his arms and held her close to his chest. The ruby pendant tinkled against the blade of the kunai from over their heads.
"Yugao," Shisui said, gesturing to the necklace above them.
She nodded and pocketed the evidence with a gloved hand. Fingerprinting wasn't his favorite task and was the least likely to yield a lead, but it was better than nothing. The rest of the carnage was flawless, if such a word could be used. Other than the single kunai left behind, the attacker had left without a trace. From the looks of it, it was a standard Konoha kunai. Indistinguishable from the brace of them he carried in his pouch.
"Mask up," Yugao warned as they walked back toward the other two members of their ANBU team. Shisui nodded, sticking his hip out for Yugao so she could untie the mask from his belt. Sakura's hair tickled beneath his chin as he held her close against his chest, cradled in his arms.
The necklace bothered him, as well as the small bruised lines around the sides of her neck. It had been ripped off at some point. He couldn't help but feel it was a warning. A threat or a promise, though she had been the only one spared out of a team of five.
Two Years Earlier:
Humid air clung to Sakura's skin as she leaned back in the wicker chair on Shizune's patio. Music blasted from the speakers inside and vibrated the wood deck outside. Errant stars peeped out from the haze of Konoha's light pollution. The door slid open again. Soundless footsteps crossed the patio before their owner sat in the opposite chair. He slid over a condensating bottle of fruity alcohol.
"Not one for engagement parties either?" Shisui asked, taking a long sip of his beer.
Sakura shrugged. "Not one for all the lovey-dovey-ness that's going on in there. I'm surprised Shizune had the time. People in our positions don't have time to make relationships work."
She held the glass bottle in her hand up to the light, letting the colors swirl in her drunken state.
"Harsh opinion. But I see your point." He watched with a raised brow as she manipulated the glass and the light to refract off of the hardwood. "Do you want me to open that for you?"
With a drunken snort, she nodded, sliding it back across the table. "Can't say I have much strength without chakra. And I may be just a little drunk." She held up her thumb and index finger a wide distance apart.
Shisui smirked at her while he easily twisted off the metal top. "In that case, I'm not sure it'd be entirely responsible of me to give this to you."
"Please, you're sloshed too."
He laughed, an easy sound that settled against and multiplied the bubbles that were floating in her stomach. Leaning in conspiratorially, he whispered, "Full transparency, I came out here hoping to seduce you into my bed."
She mirrored his motion, and dropped her voice, "Full transparency, you could have had me in your bed whenever you wanted."
Not the answer he was expecting, apparently. He leaned back in his chair and swallowed. She watched as his Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. With a small huff, he took another long drink of his beer and watched her. "You, Sakura Haruno, are very drunk."
"And very horny." She leaned over and ran her hand up his inner thigh. The straps of her dress slipped down her shoulder as she flashed her cleavage toward him, and if a nipple slipped, then more the better. "Are you going to help take care of me, Shisui Uchiha?"
Shisui took a quick drink of his beer, letting his eyes slip down to her breasts. He coughed when the drink went down the wrong side of his throat. Sakura jumped out of the way. Beer spewed across the patio. His wide eyes and gaped-mouth made Sakura cackle. She finally piled herself back into her own chair. The cackle turned into a giggle, and continued to grow into an outright laugh.
"Aren't you smooth," she teased.
Wet beer stains dotted the front of his white shirt that he feverishly blotted with a spare napkin. Sakura opened her purse and passed a small package of tissues.
"Ah, thanks. I was teasing, you know."
"I know."
"You're a very beautiful woman, but I'm not the type for a serious relationship. Friends is the best I'm able to do."
"I'm hurt you don't already consider us friends." She leaned back in her seat and held the end of the bottle to her lips.
A small smile crossed his lips that hid in his shadow as he collected the discarded napkins and tissues. "We're friends. Just not friends with benefits. You're not the type for that, trust me."
"You're so sure about that, are you? I'm twenty-two, Shisui. I've never had a real relationship because I've never had time for one. The best I can do is a one-night stand."
Shisui was silent and sipped the dregs of his beer. Sakura watched his forearms flex beneath his rolled-up sleeves.
"Twenty-two, huh? Practically a baby."
"Yes, well, old enough to know not to play with poison-laced kunai while black-out drunk with Genma."
"Touche. That was forever ago, anyway."
The ghost of a smile returned. She liked this side of Shisui, the calm, relaxed side. When he wasn't trying to be suave and aloof. The world saw only the veneers that Shisui liked to portray: the carefree playboy and the serious workaholic.
"I see you, you know."
"I'd be worried if you didn't." He chuckled and took the empty bottle from her hand. "If you want, I know a good optometrist. Get that vision checked out."
Sakura threw a wadded-up napkin at him that he deftly caught and added to the pile in his hand.
"Alright, let's see you stand up," he said.
Stifling a giggle, Sakura shook her head. "I'm not that drunk, you know."
"Yeah, yeah. Humor me. I'm not about to invite you for a round of…what did you call it again?"
"Catch the poisoned kunai."
"That. I learned my lesson with Genma."
"Turned out well enough for him."
Shisui was silent as he walked back to her and held out his hand. Damn him, he was right. She wobbled to her feet, letting the night spin around her in a wash of colors. Not him, though. He remained in complete focus. The furrowed brows and steady eye contact she had come to appreciate the few times she had been loaned to his team were on her. Deciding to play it up, she ran her hands up his forearms, and, grabbing the back of his elbows to settle herself, she rested her head on his chest. While she could still blame it on the drink, she went one step further and lifted her lips to his pulse. He smelled like expensive cologne, beer, and lemon laundry detergent.
Some nights she had wondered what his arms would feel like around her. His hands caressing her upper back and waist. Gods, he was warm against the cool night air. They should bottle him up to open on lonely nights when the wind blew a little too hard, she thought.
"Sakura?" Shisui asked, his voice vibrating in his chest and against her cheek. He smelled good. It was then she realized she was stroking her cheek against his shirt like a cat in heat, purr and all—it made the room stop spinning. "Kakashi is going to kill me."
"You'd have to get in line," she mumbled back half asleep while standing against him. "Teshi is first in line, and that was five years ago. Isamu is second, I think."
"You think?" He huffed, his hot breath tickled the loose hairs on the top of her head. "Wait. Teshi? ANBU dunce Teshi?"
"The same. It wasn't a great first choice, but, well…" Sakura shrugged and closed her eyes again.
"I'm invested now. Who else?"
She could practically feel his smirk above her head. "Nosey."
"A bit. Let's get you home."
They swayed and sashayed through the streets in zig-zagged lines, singing a repeat of an old academy song about kunai throws. When they finally reached her apartment door, Sakura giggled with every attempt to fish her keys from her pocket.
Shisui steadied her with his hands on her waist and reached into her pocket. His fingers wiggled from the bottom side.
He chuckled, dropping his forehead to her shoulder, chest rattling with suppressed laughter. The more she giggled, the louder he laughed, until they were both laughing like lunatics on the second story landing.
"Come on, I'll let you stay at my place, you lush."
"Oh I don't know about that. I might try to deduce you later."
"Deduce me, hmm? You gonna have me all figured out?"
The strap from her dress slipped down her shoulder again, as she let her eyes rove across his form. "All of you, yeah."
"Right now? On your apartment landing?"
He cupped her chin in his hand and gently lifted her face up to meet his lips in a gentle peck.
"You're adorable, you know that? Can you even walk straight?"
Her cheeks were on fire from the drink, his tender touch, the way one hand was still on the back of her hip, his thumb swiping across the bottom of her jaw. If anyone was seducing anyone, he had it backward. There was a loud cough from the bottom of the concrete staircase, and the spell was broken.
"If I say no, will you carry me?" she teased, gripping onto the stair railing. With her face turned away from him, she could hide the blush that had taken over her face and her shaking hands.
"Sure, why not?" Shisui said from the top of the stairs. In the space of an instant, she was cradled in his arms. He bounced down the stairs, causing her stomach to turn. "Don't worry, princess. You can sleep it off at my place. We'll find your keys in the morning."
The crook of his neck was warm against her nose, his cologne sharp enough to overshadow the radiating nausea. She closed her eyes in contentment. She didn't want to tell him she had thought about this for over a year. Dreamed of it.
Present Day
Ice rained down from the branches high atop the trees with every pass of Shisui's feet against their boughs. Sakura shuddered in his arms, his grip turning bloodless against the wool blanket he had wrapped her in. Ragged breaths puffed white against the wind as he raced against time.
"Just a bit longer, sweetheart. I promise." The ceramic mask muted every word.
Time passed painfully slow as he sprinted to Konoha General Hospital. He could hear his team panting behind him in a laborious effort to keep up with his speed. He didn't care. Hayate would understand if Yugao returned out of breath. After all, Hayate had warned him about falling in love with a fellow operative. Fuck. He had warned him, and he didn't listen. After all, he had fallen for Sakura Haruno months before he talked to her at Genma's engagement party.
Hell. He fell for her before he had challenged Genma to that stupid game of 'Catch the Kunai.' Sakura was the reason he had been drinking that night. Sometime in the ten months she covered for Yugao's maternity leave on his ANBU team, he had fallen for her. And like an idiot, he had slept around, hoping to get her out of his system, convinced it was simply hormones.
"Just a bit longer," he whispered again.
She was feverish now, shaking in his arms. When they had stopped last night, Yugao suspected that one of her ribs had nicked a vital organ. Yugao was every bit a competent combat medic, but she wasn't her.
Scattered trees thickened into the Hashirama forest that marked the Land of Fire's borders. Sakura shivered again, her eyes moving in rapid succession beneath closed eyelids.
"A bit longer."
2 Years Earlier
"Good morning, sleepyhead!" Sakura chirped cheerfully when Shisui groggily walked into his kitchen.
Grey KMPH sweatpants clung low on his hips and bare torso, and she quickly looked up at his disheveled hair and red eyes.
"How are you not hungover?"
"I made you breakfast for letting me spend the night. Come here." She moved her fingers against the sides of his temples with a quick burst of chakra to try to heal his headache. He jumped back in surprise and caught her wrists in his hands. "Just trying to relieve your hangover, you're so touchy."
"Sorry, I…"
Sakura shrugged and flipped over the pancakes on the griddle. "Don't be sorry. It's human instinct."
"Yeah, I um. Never had a woman spend the night before. I was surprised you're still here."
She could feel her cheeks begin to heat at the feel of his chest behind her when he reached up for a glass.
"I think a few aspirin and some electrolytes and you'll be fine," Sakura mumbled.
Drunk, hungover, and looking worse for wear, Shisui still looked like sex on a stick. Brown short curls stuck up on the right side of his head, completely disheveled on the top as though he was constantly running his hands through them. Even his hands were beautiful. Masculine, speckled with faint freckles from long days working in the sun. Calluses ran the sides of his index fingers and the edge of his thumb from a lifetime of working with blades. Neatly trimmed nails devoid of the slight nicks and scars that other shinobi had. No, he was too elite, too fast to gain any scars.
Deep veins flexed from beneath his skin as he easily opened the bottle of aspirin she had pulled down earlier. Professional curiosity, she attempted to lie to herself, that's all she was interested in. Not in the way the entire musculature of his hand flexed around the bottle. Nor the way she had admired how gentle they could be while helping his aunt with flowers in the garden. Nor how harsh when a stray nuke-nin had mouthed off to her. Professional. She was admiring the veins and how easy they would be to...
"Sakura?" He was impossibly close now; she could feel his breath move the small hairs on the back of her neck. Though when he had moved so close to her without her noticing, she wasn't sure, she was too focused on his damn hands.
"Hmm?" Her cheeks heated further. She could feel the blush dipping down to her upper chest.
"Your pancakes are burning."
"Shit!"
Grey smoke curdled off the top as the bitter burnt smell filled his small kitchen. Still white, their bubbled tops were rimmed in black burn from beneath.
Shisui raised a brow and crossed the kitchen, opening the window above the sink. "Maybe we get breakfast instead? My treat, I promise."
"We have two good pancakes. One each. Besides, I told you I don't have time to date."
She could still feel her cheeks burning above the top of the KMPH shirt she had borrowed from the drawer in his guest bedroom. He was quiet and watched her carefully from the window with his hands on the counter.
"Not a date. I'm taking my friend out to breakfast. Naruto takes you out to breakfast all the time."
"How do you know that?"
Shisui shrugged. "Everyone knows that. You both get ramen for breakfast every Wednesday after sparring together."
Present Time
Green eyes blinked blearily against the paling winter light hidden behind the trees. Shisui held up his fist to stop the team and dropped to the forest floor below, barely outside of Konoha's large wooden gates. He pointed to Yugao then the gate, and she took off in a dead sprint.
"Look at me, sweetheart," Shisui coaxed. "Look at me."
Sakura's eyes remained unfocused, her chest heaving beneath his hands.
"Look at me. It's just me."
A feeble hand shot out from beneath the blanket, and he tucked it into his own gloved hand, placing it on his cheek beneath his mask.
"It's Shisui. You're safe, I promise."
The focus slowly came into her eyes as she met his. "Shisui?" she croaked through dried, cracked lips.
"Yeah. It's me."
"Shisui...you look tired."
He huffed a watery laugh then lifted his mask above his lips. All of the tenderness he wished she would let him say spilled from his lips to her forehead, the end of her nose, then finally her lips. Her eyes were closed once more by the time he was done. He dropped his ceramic-covered forehead against hers and waited for the Yugao to return with the medic team.
"I love you," he whispered. "This won't happen again, I won't let it. I swear."
Two Years Earlier
Sakura drew circling spirals on the laminate restaurant table. The oil from the pad of her finger made a trail through the layered grease that the cleaning chemicals had not been able to clean off.
"So," she started hesitantly as Shisui took a bit of rice from his bowl. "You brought up 'friends with benefits' last night. And I was just curious. How would that look to you? Or how would that go?"
Shisui raised an eyebrow and nodded his head.
"I just mean. Ugh. If you want to. It just seemed a bit like you were maybe interested?"
He continued to look at her in silence.
She growled and pushed away from the table. She could feel her face flaming when she turned away.
"I'm interested," Shisui said, wiping his face with his napkin. "But are you?"
Sakura turned around and walked slowly back to the table. "I am. But. We need rules."
"Go ahead."
"Alright. One: no emotions. I don't think either of us have time for all that. Two: No getting attached. We're both free to date as we please. Friends with benefits only. To relieve some stress and…" The blush had begun to migrate down the tops of her arms from her neck. Her heart sped up in her chest as he calmly continued to eat his breakfast. Nothing gave his emotions away, he was a master at deception. However, she wished she knew how he was so bad at cards if he could be this calm when discussing sex.
"Go on, sweetheart," Shisui prodded gently.
"Only fun. We're not planning on starting a relationship out of this. Just fun."
"Alright, you have a deal. Those three rules work for me: no emotions, no attachments, only fun."
Sakura smiled at him and exhaled. "Great. Do you want to…?"
Damn the man who couldn't keep his face straight when his lip started to twitch in a suppressed laugh.
Sakura slapped his shoulder and whisper-screeched, "Shisui! You are seriously not stringing me along right now are you?!"
"I think the other diners would object to me fucking you on the breakfast table," Shisui joked. "Tell you what though; we play cards at my place tonight or, I don't know, meet at the library and see where things go."
"Can't. I work."
"What time are you off?"
"Nine?"
"Alright. I'll come get you from the hospital."
"It's not a date."
The waitress came over and slid the bill face down on the table. Without a single glance toward it, Shisui had placed a few bills inside. It was almost nice having someone else take care of the bill for once, and not expecting her to do it.
"It's not. Just two friends hanging out together." Shisui reassured her.
